


You Can Plan on Me

by fardareismai



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: All The Tropes, Christmas Fluff, F/M, Nine x Rose - Freeform, based on a movie, current ten x reinette, fake dating trope, fake engagement trope, ten x rose past relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-16
Updated: 2016-12-30
Packaged: 2018-09-09 02:19:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 15,389
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8871850
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fardareismai/pseuds/fardareismai
Summary: It was supposed to be Rose's wedding, but now it's Jeanne's, and Rose can't possibly go alone.  Surely her best friend, Alistair, can help.A Nine x Rose Christmastime AU written for Fleurdeneuf with a side of Ten x Reinette, just to be sure everyone hates me by the end of it.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [fleurdeneuf](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fleurdeneuf/gifts).



> **Merry Christmas my lovelies!  What we have here is a Nine x Rose-flavoured Christmas present for one of my favorite people in the world, Fleurdeneuf.**
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> **She outlined this story for me, based on the Hallmark Channel Original Movie "A December Bride," and while my version is doing some things that are slightly different both from Fleur's outline and the film, I hope she likes it anyway.**
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> **Warning, for those interested, Ten is in this story, and he ends up with Reinette.  Rose ends up with Nine (spoilers, but if you couldn't see that coming, you aren't paying enough attention).  If Ten/Reinette is not your jam, I totally understand walking away.**
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> **I hope you are all having a fantastic and brilliant Christmas/Holiday season.**
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> **(I do intend to have all chapters posted by New Year's Day, or Jan. 2. There should be 5 in total.)**

Why, Rose wondered, glaring at the ice-blue envelope sitting on her kitchen table, plan a Christmas wedding if you weren't going to use a red-and-green theme? If you were going to interrupt the already-busy holiday season, the least you could do is make it feel Christmas-y. For a wedding with a generic "winter" theme, you could push your nuptials off to January when things weren't quite as hectic.

She could distinctly remember telling John exactly that as they had planned their own Christmas wedding.

" _We'll have a Christmas tree at the front behind the minister, a great big one, and the ornaments will be the favors!" she had enthused as she leaned against him on their sofa. "We'll do multi-coloured fairy lights-"_

" _Wouldn't white be better?" he'd asked, interrupting. "They're more traditional."_

" _I know, but I like multi-coloured, they're more fun and more seasonal. White fairy lights get put up at every wedding, but these will be totally Christmas-y."_

Her envelopes were holly-berry-red, the invitations green, and her bridesmaids dresses had been pretty cocktail dresses in red satin. The traditional and simple cake-and-punch reception was a punch-and-Christmas-cookie reception (all cookies made by the bridal party), and the first dance was "Give Love on Christmas" by the Jackson 5.

Or it would have been.

Instead, a year to the day after the wedding Rose should have had, John was getting married in an icy blue-and-silver ceremony that he and Rose couldn't have afforded in a hundred years, but Rose's cousin Jeanne could.

It had been mid-November the previous year when, in the midst of a huge flurry of wedding plans, John had begged her to take a night off.

" _We haven't seen our friends in ages, Rose. Ali doesn't like anyone but you and me, so he hasn't been out in as long as we have, and your cousin never comes to England anymore. We have our whole lives to spend with each other, we shouldn't neglect our mates."_

So Rose had, against her better judgement, agreed to set their friend Alistair up with her cousin Jeanne and then go on a double-date with the pair of them.

She should have known there would be trouble when the argument had started about where they were going to go on this brilliant idea of John's.

" _Ali and I work at the gallery, John, we don't want to go there in our off-hours. Why can't we go to the pub? It'll be trivia night- between you and Ali no one will be able to touch us. It'd be fun!"_

" _Jeanne is in from Paris, Rose. She's not going to want to go to our grubby local, she's going to want to do something classy. Besides, don't you want to show off your gallery to her?"_

" _Sure I do, but I don't want to play tour guide when I'm on a date."_

" _The date's not for us, Rose, it's for Jeanne and the Doctor. You and I are just there to chaperone- we've got our whole lives together, these two are just starting!"_

" _Couldn't we go to one of the other galleries or museums? Anywhere but ours, please?"_

" _You know we can't afford that. Come on, sweetheart, isn't it worth it if Jeanne and Ali find what we have together? Isn't true love worth any price?"_

He'd convinced her, and, though Ali had been surprised at the plan when Rose had told him at work the next day, he too had agreed.

Rose should have known that everything was going to go wrong from the first moment Jeanne had seen Ali.

" _But he's so old, Rose!" Jeanne said in her patently-false French accent. She'd only grown up three miles from the flat Rose's mother still lived in, after all._

" _Old?" Rose had been taken-aback. Ali was several years older than she was, but she'd never considered him old. He had a classic, ageless quality about him, like a Roman statue. "He's only thirty-eight," she objected._

" _That is more than ten years older than me, ma petite, and almost twenty years older than you. Hasn't he got friends his own age? And that nose! So unfortunate. Your darling John is a much better catch. A pity you've already clipped that angel's wings."_

God, but it should have been obvious- all the signs were there. After Jeanne had been unconscionably rude to Ali, Rose had asked John to entertain her while she soothed her friend. He had done so and, by the time Rose and Ali had rejoined the other two, they had been speaking rapid French to each other with their heads together, Jeanne clinging to John's arm. Rose hadn't even known John spoke French.

Two weeks later, Rose had had to cancel her reservation at the little hall that had been intended to host the happiest day of her life. She hadn't gotten the deposit back.

Really, it took a lot of nerve for John and Jeanne (and wasn't that just too too twee) to invite her to their wedding, except that Rose knew everyone in the family had been invited. Jeanne hadn't added to the insult by asking her to be a bridesmaid or inviting her to the hen's night, but it still stung. December 18 should have been Rose's first anniversary with John. Instead, if her mother got her way, Rose would spend the day in an uncomfortable dress watching John marry someone else.

Rose needed a drink.

As though this thought was a cue, her phone vibrated on the table with a text.

_Tell me you haven't checked your mail yet, and if so, DON'T_

Rose almost smiled to see Ali's name at the top of her phone's screen, and knew exactly what he was on about.

_You're too late, I've already seen it. You don't have one, do you?_

Ali had been John's friend longer than hers- it'd been his connection to John that had gotten her the job at the gallery in the first place- but he'd chosen her side in the split and had never looked back. As far as she knew, he hadn't so much as spoken to John in a year.

_No, but Donna just got hers. I'm on my way over, and I'm bringing vodka. Doctor's orders._

Rose considered telling him she was fine, that she'd rather be alone, and that she couldn't drink because she had to work in the morning, but, save for her work schedule, it would all have been a lie. She told herself it wouldn't have mattered anyway- Ali was as stubborn as they came, when he wanted to be, and nothing she could say would sway his mind.

Twenty minutes later, there was a perfunctory knock on her door before the handle was turned and Ali walked in, dressed in black jeans, red jumper, and black leather jacket, a bag from Tesco and one from the liquor store hanging from one of his hands, and a greasy bag that Rose recognized as coming from the corner chippy cradled in the curve of his elbow.

"I've got popcorn, hot chocolate mix, chips, and vodka," he announced without even saying hello.

"How did you manage that? Has that old car of yours turned into a time machine since last I checked?" Rose asked.

"I was in the neighborhood anyway," Ali explained, making himself at home in her kitchen by putting away the groceries he'd brought. "I'd already thought I might drop by tonight. Jack called me this morning."

Rose groaned and dropped her head onto the back of the couch. Jack had called her the previous night to tell her that he would be standing up with John at his wedding, and to apologize, practically in tears, for doing so.

She told Ali the same thing she'd told Jack: "I never asked anyone to stop being friends with John, and I wouldn't want them to anyway. It's fine."

Ali didn't say anything, just grunted and closed the last cabinet before pulling the two styrofoam trays of fish and chips out of the last bag and setting them on the breakfast table. The invitation was still sitting there, and he picked it up, narrowing his eyes as he realized what he must be holding.

"Blue and silver is passe," he said as he pulled the lovely, lightly metallic silver card from the envelope.

Rose snorted. As though Ali would have even the slightest idea what was was in fashion or not.

He raised his eyebrows once his sharp blue eyes reached the name of the church and reception hall.

"They're sparing no expense, are they?" he mused.

"I'm sure Jeanne's daddy is bankrolling the whole thing," Rose said, trying hard to keep the bitterness out of her voice.

"I've never understood why people spend that much money on a wedding. It should be an intimate, important day, not a day to show off how much money you've got, I think," Ali said, tossing the card into the kitchen and bringing the chips to Rose on the sofa. He returned to the kitchen and made a cup of hot chocolate with a healthy dose of vodka in it, and a cup of tea without, and returned to the couch.

"Mum called. She says I have to go," Rose said, reaching up to take the cup of chocolate.

"She's wrong," Ali said, bluntly.

"She says that Jeanne is family and if I don't Nana will disinherit me."

"Family's overrated, and you can't miss money you never had. Besides, it's rude to show up the bride, and you're twice as beautiful as she is just sitting in your jimjams at home."

Rose gave a slightly choking laugh- she'd been fighting off tears all afternoon- and leaned against him, cheek pressed to the cool leather of the jacket he was still wearing.

"You know what'd be ideal? If I _could_ go to that bloody wedding looking perfectly gorgeous, on the arm of someone fantastically good-looking, just blissfully happy. The kind of happy that shines out of you, you know? It's petty, but that's the only thing that would make it worth it to go to that damn thing."

"Pity Jack'll be busy, he'd fit the bill perfectly." Ali's voice was oddly bitter over the statement.

"Jack's too obvious a ploy. Everyone would know I was just trying to make someone jealous, especially since he wouldn't be able to stop himself flirting with everyone in sight. No… I need someone no one would expect."

"Clara?" Ali suggested.

Rose laughed. "No, I don't think anyone would buy her either, unfortunately."

"Who then?"

"What about... you?"

Ali blinked at her for a moment, then plucked the still-full cup of hot chocolate out of her hands and took a sniff, though he'd obviously watched her take only a sip. "Did you start drinking before I got here, or are you just mad?"

Rose squirmed around to look up into his face, brown eyes wide. "What's mad about it?"

"I thought you wanted to go with someone… what was your word? Oh yeah, 'fantastically good-looking.'"

"And who says you aren't?" Rose asked, frowning.

"Are you taking the piss? My mirror, every bloody morning!"

"Remind me to get you a new mirror for Christmas," Rose said. "Besides, the aesthetics of the thing matter less than John and Jeanne believing it. I think you're the only person who could believably fake being in love with me."

Ali scowled. "Never thought I'd hear my gallery designer telling me the aesthetics of a thing don't matter. Besides, it's not _me_ that has to sell anything, it's you- you're the one who has to be supremely happy, and no one would believe you were madly in love with this daft old face for a second."

Rose scowled back. "Make fun of my best friend's looks one more time and I'll slap you silly-"

"And there's that too, your mother would slap me into next week!"

"She would not! Not if I were happy!"

"And who says you could act like you're happy, eh?"

Rose slapped her mug down on the coffee table and stood up, glaring down at him. "Stand up, you lump," she ordered.

Ali blinked, then stood, facing her.

Rose stepped into his personal space, closed her eyes and took a deep breath. When she opened her eyes, her face was completely different- her eyes were sparkling, she was grinning that grin she had with her tongue tucked into the corner, she leaned into him, pressing her breasts against his arm, even as she reached down and laced her fingers with his.

"John, Jeanne, great to see you, congratulations. You two remember Ali, of course, my boyfriend?"

She reached the hand that wasn't laced up with his across their bodies, resting it on his chest in a possessive, intimate gesture that seemed to come naturally to her.

Then she turned and looked up at Ali, her smile suddenly impish rather than flirtatious, though her eyes continued to sparkle.

"What do you think?"

Alistair thought he could hardly breathe. As many times as he told himself (and it was at least five times a day, working beside her) that Rose didn't think of him like _that_ , seeing her look at him with that smile and those eyes had stopped his heart, only to have her touch send it racing double-time, and hearing the word 'boyfriend' come out of her mouth with regards to him had sent his stomach soaring through time and space.

"What would you tell Jack? Mickey? Amy?"

"Mickey and Martha aren't going to the wedding, nor are Amy and Rory. It's Christmas, they all have plans. Jack… well Jack can know the truth. He knows us well enough to figure it out, and he wouldn't tell a secret like that."

Jack knew him well enough all right: he knew Alistair wouldn't be acting even a tiny bit.

"Honestly, Ali, it'd just be John and Jeanne we'd be lying to, and neither of us sees them more than absolutely necessary anymore anyway."

Alistair could feel himself weakening. "John, Jeanne, and your entire family," he objected.

"If necessary, I'll tell Mum that we broke up."

"Then she _will_ slap me."

Rose smiled at him. "Don't worry, you big baby, I'll protect you." Her face went serious in a moment. "Please, Ali. I'm going to have to go, and I can't go alone, I just can't. I can't face them single."

Ali stopped, just a bit surprised. Rose had, for a year, put on a brave face about the end of her relationship with John. She had always been kind, always been compassionate, and had never spoken an ill word about him or Jeanne, even as engagement announcements, bridal showers, and save the date cards had begun to appear. It was easy to forget that Rose had been in love with John, and for all she was brave, and clever, and kind, she was also a woman with pride that had been badly damaged.

"Alright," he said, finally, unable to withstand her eyes any longer, even knowing that he was probably condemning himself to the worst Christmas season of his entire life. "Alright, I'll do it. RSVP plus one."

Rose grinned and threw her arms around his neck, kissing him over and over on his cheek.

"Thank you, thank you!" she cried, right into his ear.

He made no move to stop her, to pull her away, or to shush her. An armful of Rose Tyler was, perhaps, the sweetest thing he'd ever known in all his life.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **[Insert non-offensive seasonal greeting here] everyone! I offer for your consideration on this fine and chilly Monday (at least where I am) another chapter of tropey fluff and silliness between our lovely Rose Tyler and her lovely Alistair.**
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> **A [non-offensive seasonal greeting here] to all, and to all a good night!**

Rose pulled the phone down from her ear, ended the call, and flipped the device over and over in her fingers, nervous energy bubbling up inside her like champagne.

He was _not_ going to like this.

The object of her thoughts (and more thoughts than she liked to admit to most of the time) strolled into the back room at that moment, whistling and twirling a screwdriver in his long, dexterous fingers.

"Hello, hello," Ali said, spotting her. "What are you doing back here?"

"Had to take a call," Rose said, holding up her phone. "Um… I need to speak to you, is that alright?"

"That's always alright, what's going on?"

"Um…" Rose honestly didn't know quite how to begin. "Er… do you want to sit down?"

Ali blinked at her a moment. "No… I think I'll stand. Unless you think I'll need to sit down? What's going on, Rose?"

"My mum called."

He just raised an eyebrow. "Your mum calls just about every other day, so I assume there's more to the story than that."

"She called and… she knows that I RSVPed to Jeanne's wedding with a plus-one and… and I told her I was coming with my boyfriend and… and-now-she-wants-you-too-come-to-dinner-and-meet-you-and-I-couldn't-get-you-out-of-it." This last was said in one breath and so fast that the words ran together.

Ali stood and stared for a long moment. "Your mum," he said slowly, and almost without inflection, "wants me to come to dinner."

Rose looked away. "Yeah. I'm sorry, I should never have dragged you into this. We can just come clean now and-"

"And leave you miserable at the wedding?" Ali interrupted. "I don't think so."

Rose looked up, surprised, into his face.

His face- made of elements that were each, of themselves, just slightly overdone. Cheekbones too sharp, nose too large, eyes too bright, ears that stuck out just a hair too much. And yet all those disparate elements came together to form the face that was, and had been for the last year, the most dear in her entire life.

"You don't?" Rose asked, completely wrong-footed.

Ever since she had talked (guilted) him into her ruse, she had been worrying about it. She'd grown more and more fond of Ali in the year since she and John had broken up as he had stood beside her, keeping her steady and making her laugh.

It had been in June, six months after things had ended with John, that Amy, Martha, and Clara had dragged her out to the pub for a night on the town. As the only women in the group without rings on their fingers, Rose and Clara had been deflecting male attention all night. It wasn't until the third bloke had tried to pull her that Rose had realized, when she told him she had a boyfriend, the person she was imagining was Ali.

She had assumed that the feeling was a function of John and Jeanne's recently announced bridal shower, but in the following weeks and months, she had taken it out and examined it. She'd tested it by imagining him doing all the things that boyfriends did: meeting her mother, nights out at restaurants or the cinema, evenings at home, curled together on the sofa, and kisses.

The funny thing had been how few of her imaginings had been imaginary. She and Ali went out to films and restaurants every few weeks, and on nights that they were too tired or uninterested in other people, they stayed in together, side-by-side on the sofa, watching Netflix. Occasionally they got dressed up for gallery events and hob-nobbed together, smirking at each other over their champagne glasses. He'd even met her mother, though only at the gallery through work.

Honestly, except for the kissing bit (and don't think she hadn't thought of it) she and Ali were practically dating already.

And here he was, apparently willing to spend time with her mother away from work.

"You… you want to go to dinner with my mum?" she asked, trying to clarify the point that seemed impossible.

Ali shrugged. "Wanting to and being willing to are two different things."

"You were the one who was worried about her slapping you yesterday!" Rose argued.

Another shrug. "And you were the one who called me a baby and promised to protect me." He gave her a grin. "I'm holding you to that both for her right hook and for her shepherd's pie."

Rose snorted. "She says her new bloke is a good cook, but her standards are… unique."

Ali shook his head. "Your new artist out there has unique standards," he said, gesturing to the main gallery where Rose had spent much of the morning placing canvasses from a man who never painted in any colour but blue. "I'm pretty sure your mother's taste buds are actually from another planet."

Rose laughed, and the twisting in her stomach stopped. He was good at that, Alistair- making her laugh and reassuring her.

If Jeanne's wedding invitation hadn't wiped all sense and restraint from her, she'd thought she might make it a resolution in the new year to ask him out. Her friends kept saying that she needed to get out again, not spend all her life pining after John, and she thought Ali would be safe- he'd never hurt her the way John had done.

This ridiculous farce had probably scuppered those plans completely, and Rose was assiduously ignoring the disappointment that fact generated.

"Just promise me I don't have to wear a collared shirt," Ali added.

Rose shook her head. "I know you think I'm mad, but that is a bridge too far, even for me. Your jumper and jeans will be fine, though I think I should warn you that the wedding is black tie."

Ali sighed. "Nothing good ever happens when I'm forced to wear a tux. But-" he added, cutting Rose off as she opened her mouth, "I'll do it for you. Just this once, mind."

As she returned to work- temperamental artists and indecipherable paintings- Rose tried to push down the flood of warmth and pleasure that had risen up in her when he'd smiled at her that way.

~?~?~?~?~

Jackie was glaring holes into Rose's back as Rose took plates down from the cupboard to set the table.

"Why am I only _now_ hearing that you've got a boyfriend then?" she asked.

Rose was actually impressed at her restraint. She'd expected those to be the first words out of her mother's mouth when she'd arrived at the flat in which she'd grown up, but Jackie had managed to say hello, kiss her cheek, and ask how her week had been before getting to the question of the moment.

The one benefit of her mother being so predictable was that Rose had been able to sort out her answers ahead of time.

"We kept it secret," she explained, as she and Ali had agreed. "We were worried about getting in trouble at work."

"And now?" Jackie asked, suspiciously.

"I couldn't very well go to the wedding alone, and Ali didn't like the idea of me going with anyone else-" he'd been rather adamant about that part, "-so it seemed like time to come out of the shadows. We talked to Sarah Jane, the owner, and she honestly doesn't care as long as it doesn't interfere with our work."

"And he's _how_ old?"

Rose sighed. "Thirty-nine," she answered as though she'd answered it a hundred times before.

"Sixteen years is a hell of an age gap, Rose."

Howard, who had up to this point been cooking quietly at the stove, looked up. "Is it, Jackie?" he asked, mildly. "You and I are fifteen years apart. I hadn't realized it was so concerning to you."

"It's different!" she cried, illogically. "I'm not twenty-three!"

"Really?" Howard asked, sweetly. "You don't look a day over."

Rose smirked as she pushed past Jackie, who was looking decidedly soppy, and into the dining area. She'd worried about her mother when she'd moved out with John initially, and then more when she didn't move back home after the breakup, but Howard seemed to be taking good care of her. They were actually rather sweet, the pair of them.

After a minute, Jackie followed Rose back into the kitchen, continuing to watch her, though her look had softened.

"I worry about you, Rose," she finally said as Rose folded napkins to go under the flatware. "First there was all that business with Jimmy Stone-"

"Alistair is nothing like Jimmy," Rose interrupted, annoyed at even the implication.

"That's what you said about John."

"And I was right. John isn't anything like Jimmy either- he never hurt me like that."

"No, he hurt you worse."

Rose shook her head. "That's arguable. John did a lot of good for me, you know. He supported me going back for my A-Levels, then he introduced me to Sarah Jane and Ali, which got me my job at the gallery."

"Seems only fair as he left you practically at the altar for your rich cousin," Jackie said darkly.

Rose didn't meet her mother's eyes. "He loved her more than he loved me," she said, as she always seemed to.

Jackie sighed and shook her head. "You're too sweet by half, Rose, and it's going to get you walked all over."

Rose didn't say anything. Her artists at the gallery wouldn't have said she was sweet- stubborn, opinionated, even explosive, but not sweet- but she didn't have it in her to hate anyone, even John or Jimmy.

Fortunately, a knock at the flat's door interrupted this line of maudlin thought. Howard answered the knock, and she could hear Ali's voice in the hall, greeting Howard and offering compliments on the smell of the food.

Rose turned to look at her mother who was, to her surprise, watching her shrewdly.

"He makes you smile, so that's something," Jackie said. "And I suppose I am glad you're not pining after John."

With that, she turned sharply to go into the entry hall and greet her visitor, leaving Rose slightly perplexed behind.

By the time Ali had been led into the kitchen, Rose had fixed a smile on her face. She crossed to him and rose up on her toes to kiss his cheek.

She hadn't considered it (mostly because she hadn't thought the plan through at all before blurting it out to Ali the previous week) but if she had to pretend to be dating anyone, Ali was the perfect candidate. They were, already, near-inseparable, and physically affectionate, and he was proving, to Rose's slight surprise, to be a good actor as well. Her kiss to his cheek was their standard greeting, but the way his hand found the small of her back as she did so, then lingered there possessively when she was finished most assuredly was not.

It added to the verisimilitude of the game, and made her stomach feel like she'd just passed the first drop on a roller coaster, so Rose didn't mind.

Jackie was carrying a bottle of wine when they re-entered, and she showed it to Rose.

"Your Alistair brought wine. Nice stuff too. I'll go pour everyone a glass while Howard finishes dinner then, why don't I?"

Jackie and Howard went back into the kitchen, leaving Rose and Ali alone for the moment. Rose looked up at him through her dark lashes and felt her heart skip as his bright blue eyes found hers.

"Thank you for doing this, Ali," she said, softly. "Honestly, thank you."

Ali shook his head and smiled down at her gently, that warm, soft look that she had never seen him give anyone else she knew.

"How many times do I need to tell you, Rose Tyler, that you're worth it?"


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **To no one's surprise more than mine, writing this story is going very well, thank you for asking. I am being careful to keep one chapter ahead of where I'm posting to be sure that Fleur gets one on Fanfiction Friday and, if I have anything to say about it, Christmas Day.**
> 
> **That said, I'll get out of your way and let you read this chapter with Jack in it, 'cause Jack is awesome.**

Rose was standing in front of a canvass that looked like it was made of light when Jack walked into the gallery. She seemed not to notice him, which gave Jack the rare opportunity to just look at her without her knowing.

Jack had never been able to understand what had drawn John to Jeanne, leaving Rose behind. Physically the two women were similar: small and slim and blond, though Rose was curvier and Jeanne just a bit more angular.

He supposed, if he had to make a diagnosis, Rose had always challenged John, and Jeanne flattered him, and in the end, he'd chosen his ego.

Jack remained friends with John, and liked Jeanne fine, but he would never understand John's choice, and he had never quite forgiven him for it. He was glad Rose had neither asked nor expected him to stop seeing John, but he would have if she'd done so.

Rose sighed heavily enough that Jack could see her shoulders move from across the gallery, apparently released from whatever spell the painting had held her under. She turned and for the first time, appeared to see him.

"Jack," she cried, face splitting into a grin as she hurried toward him, her ballet flats making no noise on the hard floor of the gallery. "You're early, we weren't supposed to meet until lunchtime!"

Jack caught her running and scooped her up into a bear hug that had the toes of her shoes barely brushing the floor. He set her back on her feet and leaned back to look into her face, though he kept his arms looped loosely around her waist.

"Funny rumors going around about you, Rosie. Makes it hard to know what to believe."

Rose frowned up at him, dropping her arms from around his neck. "Rumors? What kind of rumors?"

"Rumors like you're not only coming to this farce of John and Jeanne's, but that you're bringing someone. I hear it's a boyfriend someone, but I know that can't be true, because Rose Tyler would not have gotten herself a boyfriend without telling her best friend Jack, now would she?"

"Jack-" Rose began.

"And that's not the only thing I've heard either," Jack continued, as though she hadn't spoken. "Where's tall, big-eared, and handsome now? I need to hear this from both of you."

"You mean-"

"Yup," Jack said, interrupting her again. "The way I hear it, this mysterious boyfriend no one's heard anything about is none other than the Doctor." No one but Jack, Donna, and John called Ali "the Doctor" anymore (it had been his childhood nickname), and presumably John no longer did. "I need to shake his hand for catching the best girl in all of London, and then punch him for not telling me."

"Who are you hearing this from?" Rose asked.

"Well I actually _saw_ the RSVP with the plus-one with my own bonnie blue eyes," Jack said with a smirk. "That 'plus-one' means 'boyfriend,' and 'boyfriend' means Ali are only rumor, but the source is pretty reputable."

"My mum?" Rose asked with a sigh.

Jack just shrugged.

Rose shook her head. "This wasn't how you were supposed to hear…"

Jack's face split I to a wide grin, showcasing his perfect teeth. "So are you telling me it's true? Rose Tyler domesticated the great Doctor? I'd always hoped you could do it, Rosie… well, not _always_ since we all figured with John and everything…"

Rose glanced around the gallery, then grabbed Jack's hand to pull him toward the back.

"Come on," she muttered. "It's not really that simple, and Ali's going to want to be there to explain it to you."

Jack said nothing, just trotted along in her wake like a dog at heel.

In the back, Ali was crouched in front of a fuse box, cursing quietly as he poked around inside. His leather jacket was rolled up under his knees for cushioning and the sleeves of his green jumper were rolled up over his forearms. Jack had to forcibly restrain himself from wolf-whistling, and couldn't quite stop himself licking his lips.

"Ali?" Rose called softly, trying to avoid startling him. "Do you have a moment?"

For all her care, Ali still jumped and appeared to burn himself on the electrical wires. He cursed more loudly and stuck his finger in his mouth, then turned to shoot a glare at Rose, which morphed into a look of surprise when he saw her companion.

"Harkness," he said, looking quite silly as he spoke around the finger still in his mouth. "What are you doing here?"

"I was planning on taking your lovely girlfriend wedding dress shopping," Jack said with a wicked grin.

Ali's eyes went wide for a moment, then narrowed to look at Rose.

"That would be 'shopping for a dress for the wedding,' Jack," she said, sounding annoyed.

"You say tah-may-toe, I say tah-mah-toe," Jack sing-songed. "Actually, reverse that."

"I thought we were holding off telling him until we could do it together," Ali cut across this silliness.

"Yes well, my mother hasn't proven to be very circumspect with the news."

"There are many words which could describe Jackie Tyler, but I don't think 'circumspect' has ever been one," Ali said darkly. "Are you telling me John knows?"

"I don't know," Rose said, then turned to Jack. "Does John know?"

"Does John know what?" Jack asked, finally exasperated. "You two haven't explained yourselves to _me_ yet."

"Does John know we're telling people we're dating?" Rose said quickly.

" _Telling_ people you're- no, you know what? I'm going to need a drink to understand this. Ali, get your shapely butt off the floor, I'm taking you two to the pub."

"I have to work!" Ali cried at the same time Rose objected, "but what about my dress?"

Jack sighed. "You don't have to drink then," he said to Ali. To Rose he conceded, "fine, but we're going to one of those formalwear stores that offers a glass of wine. If you're going to drag me through these shenanigans without a martini, the least you can do is let me have champagne."

"I never agreed to go dress shopping," Ali groused, though he appeared already to be giving in.

"She's your girlfriend, mate," Jack said, shaking his head. "You agreed to go dress shopping the moment you agreed to that arrangement."

"That's not exactly-"

"I'm not his-"

Jack waved a hand to stop both explanations. "Don't tell me anything until there's a bit less blood in my alcohol stream, why don't you? Come on, you two. You're just lucky you're both so good-looking or I wouldn't put up with this from either of you."

~?~?~?~?~

"So that's it," Ali concluded with a shrug. "I couldn't let her go on her own, could I?"

Jack finished off his glass of champagne and sighed. "You two are the most frustrating human beings on the planet. Possibly in all of time and space."

"What are you on about?" Ali asked, annoyed.

Jack glanced at the entryway to the dressing rooms into which Rose had been shuffled several minutes before by an unsettlingly-chipper salesgirl who had introduced herself as Lynda-with-a-Y, leaving Ali to the explanation of their scheme, and lowered his voice.

"You've been madly in love with Rose Tyler for _years_ , Doc. Why not just ask her out and go to the wedding as her real boyfriend? Why all this… dancing around?"

"It was her idea, Jack. Not just going together, but going and pretending to be together. She was quite clear on that- it's all fake to her." Ali shook his head. "Honestly, why wouldn't it be?"

Jack frowned. He had his own suspicions about Rose's feelings on the matter, but without talking to her privately, he couldn't be sure.

He opened his mouth to argue further, but was interrupted by Rose reappearing in the first dress for their consideration.

She was wearing a knee-length pastel teal chiffon dress, and while Jack would be the first to admit that Rose looked spectacular in anything she chose to wear, the color did nothing special for her, and the dress itself was yawningly dull.

"Well?" she asked, anxiety written on her face. "Thoughts?"

"You're beautiful," Ali said, before Jack could say anything, which made him want to laugh. If he thought he was keeping his feelings for Rose Tyler secret, he was doing a terrible job.

Rose grinned at him, and Jack was pleased to see her smiling. He couldn't help but be more honest than the Doctor, however.

"No way is that the dress you're going to your ex's wedding in, Rosie. You need something much more impressive."

Rose blushed and looked away from him. "I'm not trying to… to _prove_ anything here," she muttered.

"That's bull and you know it perfectly well. You would not have developed this-" Jack waved his hands in the air to encompass everything Ali had explained to him, "-elaborate farce if you weren't trying to prove something to John and Jeanne." He stood and took Rose's hand, tugging her back into the dressing rooms and ignoring the shocked face of Lynda-with-a-Y at the idea of a man in the ladies' dressing area.

Jack pushed into Rose's room and started sorting through the gowns she'd chosen so far.

"Pastel," he muttered, tossing one aside, "shapeless, boring… god's sake Rosie," he said, holding up a dress more suited to a woman in her 50s, "are you trying to be the most forgettable person at the ball?"

"Jack-"

"And another thing," Jack said, turning to stare her down, "what are you _thinking_?"

"What?"

"You think I haven't noticed how close you and Ali have gotten this past year? You think I don't see the way you look at him? I do, and I'm totally jealous, but I just want to know what you're thinking not actually asking the poor bastard out instead of this-" he flapped a hand again as though searching for the right word, " _-dance_!"

Rose sighed and flopped onto the stood in the dressing room, shoulders hunching in upset.

"I thought about it, you know, asking him out," she said, sounding distressed.

"Then why-"

"But I couldn't do it until after the wedding. Or… at least… I couldn't do it until I was sure I was over John. I don't want to be with Ali just because I'm all broken up inside over John and Jeanne. He's better than that, Jack. He's so much more important than that!"

"So all of this?"

Rose shrugged miserably. "He came over right after I got the invitation, and Mum had told me I had to go and… and if there's anyone I can pretend to be in love with, it's Ali, you know?"

"Rose-"

"Stop, Jack," she said, finally looking up, tears dancing in her eyes, but voice hard. "I can't talk about it anymore. I have to find a dress and then get back to work."

He sighed, but nodded. Rose Tyler was no one to fight with when she was in the mood to be stubborn.

"Fine," he said with a sigh. "You stay here and I'll go find your dress. Bet you £50 I get it right on the first try." He grinned at her and was pleased to see that she was able to give him a ghost of a smile back.

"You're on."

Jack won the bet.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **I'd thought I might publish this story yesterday, but ended up getting food poisoning and not being able to do much of anything all day.**
> 
>  
> 
> **(I'm doing better now, thank you for asking)**
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> 
> **This chapter was never in the original plan, and yet here it is 'cause Rose and Ali decided to get a bit out of hand. That means that this story will be six or seven chapters long, rather than the originally expected 5. I am still hoping to have everything published by New Year's.**
> 
>  
> 
> **Happy Happy, everyone!**
> 
>  
> 
> **(For those of you interested,[this is the design of Rose's dress](http://image.dhgate.com/0x0/f2/albu/g2/M00/05/F8/rBVaG1Y7lOyAALnaAAbJbX5gu3s219.jpg), but in gold and with a long skirt, like her pink dress in The Idiot's Lantern)**

The day of John and Jeanne's wedding dawned bitterly cold and overcast and Rose was, to her own annoyance, awake to witness that fact.

Her makeup was organized in orderly rows on her bathroom counter, rather than the hectic scatter she usually preferred. Her hair dryer, curling iron, and straightener were laid out side-by-side, waiting for use. The dress Jack had chosen for her was hanging outside of her closet, still in the store's garment bag, and the shoes that he'd bought for her with the £50 he'd won in their bet were waiting beneath it.

If she were going to be awake, Rose though she could probably be getting ready. The level of perfection her appearance would require to give her the confidence to hold her head high at this wedding was going to require hours of work.

Instead she sat in front of her window, a blanket wrapped around her shoulders, watching the pearly grey fingers of dawn light London and thinking about John.

She constructed his face in her imagination- wide brown eyes, crooked smile, freckles, wonky ear, gravity-defying hair, expressive eyebrows- and just sat looking at him in her mind's eye for a few moments.

She had thought she might cry knowing that today marked the end of any possibility of him coming to his senses and returning to her, but there were no tears.

Rose had been in love with John almost from the moment she had laid eyes on him. She, a broken and abused nineteen-year-old, and he a doctor at the hospital just starting his career- they had fallen into bed together within a week of meeting, and had been dating from that moment on. He'd pushed her to be more, supported her as she had done so, loved her, listened to her, and had never looked down on her in spite of the fact that she lived on the Estate and had made so many mistakes in her life. None of them had seemed to be mistakes as they'd led her to him.

Then one day all of the _more_ that she had become hadn't been enough for him any longer. The man who had once confessed to her that his greatest fear was being left by those who loved him had left her.

Even a year later, after considering it and turning it over a thousand thousand times, she couldn't understand. And so she had decided, on balance, to stop trying and just try to forgive.

She thought that a person who had really forgiven him would be feeling happy for John today, and yet, as she watched London wake from her window, she just felt empty.

Rose was startled out of these bleak thoughts by the sound of a key in her door, and turned in time to find Ali, garment bag over his arm, and grocery bag in hand, entering her apartment.

"You're awake!" he said, sounding surprised.

"What are you doing here?" Rose asked, not responding to his asinine comment.

Her morning had felt a bit like the street outside- grey and foggy- and Ali was the first thing all day that had seemed to be in lifelike color, for all he was dressed in black.

He shrugged awkwardly, the tips of his ears turning red. "The shop I'm renting my tux from is just down the street from you, so I thought maybe I could come and make you breakfast. I thought you deserved it- today's going to be tough on you."

Rose opened her mouth to answer this, then closed it, not sure what to say.

Ali wasn't like Mickey, who'd known her since she was a child and had always considered himself half a brother to her. He wasn't like John who had shared her bed. He wasn't like Rory who loved her as much for Amy's sake as her own. He wasn't like Jack who loved everyone. Ali had no reason to love her, no reason to care for her, no reason to look at her with those bright, tender eyes save for her own self, and his good heart.

The cold, empty fog that had seemed to fill her up finally dissipated as her heart felt warm for the first time all morning, and Rose smiled. She pushed herself from her chair and crossed to her best friend and wrapped her arms around him, ignoring the fact that he still carried everything he walked in with.

She nestled her cheek against the cold, damp leather of his jacket and breathed in the chill and the rain and his own subtle, unique smell.

"Whatever I did to deserve you," she muttered into his shirt, "there's no possible way it was good enough."

~?~?~?~?~

Ali sat on Rose's sofa waiting for her to emerge from her bedroom, trying his best not to fidget. He wished he had something to do with his hands- sitting still wasn't his strong suit.

After breakfast, Rose had insisted that he stay, saying that it didn't make sense for him to go home to get ready, only to come back and pick her up right back where he'd started. Ali had let himself be convinced, berating himself in his mind for being a smitten fool, desperate for any and all time with her that he could steal. The pair of them had settled in for a few spare hours of one of their favorite pastimes: watching through the X-Files on Netflix.

Rose had obviously been awake for hours and had almost immediately settled against his side and fallen asleep. Ali had watched the pair on the screen argue and banter and completely fail to recognize their own chemistry as he told his heart to stop its relentless thrumming at her nearness.

He'd wondered if he would have to wake her, but she had twitched and stretched after about two episodes of the show and, seeming to find nothing awkward or uncomfortable about finding her head pillowed in his lap (and why should she? It wasn't as though _she_ had been imagining running her fingers through her hair and kissing her on the forehead), had asked if he wanted first go at the shower, or if she should take it.

He had politely allowed her to go first, and had spent the next twenty minutes gamely tried to force his mind not to linger on the fact that Rose Tyler was naked with nothing but a wall between the pair of them and to wonder what she would do if he joined her in the shower.

"Probably scream and call the police," he decided and sat tight, keeping company with Scully rather than Rose.

The water had turned off eventually, and some minutes later he'd been able to hear Rose moving across the hall to her bedroom.

"Bathroom's free for you to use," she'd said before closing the door. "You can change in there as well, I'll use my bedroom vanity."

That had been nearly three hours past and he was beginning to go stir-crazy. Even including the slight complication of his tie, Ali had been ready for absolutely ages. He half wanted to start fiddling with some of her appliances to see if he could get them working better (she was always complaining that the burners on her stove were uneven and the back one ran hot) but knew he'd end up getting the white sleeves of his shirt filthy if he did so, and he wouldn't put Rose through that.

Though he wasn't sure he could be held responsible for his actions if she took much longer.

As though the thought had conjured her, Rose's voice floated into the room.

"Ali," she said, sounding tentative, "could you… could you give me a hand?"

He was up at at her bedroom door in a moment, only to find her standing there looking embarrassed, clutching the beaded front of the gown that she and Jack had chosen two weeks before.

"I should have thought of this when Jack picked it out," she muttered, not meeting his eyes, "but I can't do up the back of this one by myself."

She turned and Ali nearly swallowed his tongue. Her back was on display from her shoulders all the way down to the top of the lace underpants he could see just peeking out at her hips.

He had noticed the corset-lacing on the back when first she'd stepped out of the fitting room at the dress shop, but only in a vague, appreciative way that he noticed any detail of the dress. He had been entirely overwhelmed by the sight of Rose in dark gold silk that seemed to float around her like the caressing hands of starlight.

"Blimey," he'd said as she'd appeared, not quite sure he was breathing. "You're beautiful."

Her face had split in a smile and his heart had started thrumming double-time.

"Considering I can't wear this one," Rose had said after a moment of looking at herself. "First rule of weddings: don't outdo the bride. Second is not to clash with the decor. She's doing silver and ice blue- this is too much."

Jack snorted. "Jeanne's the one in the big white dress, Rose. No one's going to mistake you for her in this. As for her decorations- you look much better in a good, deep color than a pastel and Jeanne's flowers can just live with that fact. This is the dress, Rosie. I'm not taking 'no' for an answer."

"That's just because you have money riding on it," Rose had said, shaking her head. She'd looked at herself in the mirror though, with wistful eyes.

"You look like a goddess, Rose," Ali had said, and that had, apparently, clinched it.

Now Ali found himself with a long satin ribbon, a couple-dozen loops, and what felt like several square miles of Rose Tyler's naked skin before him, and he wished, momentarily, that he'd been less complimentary.

"You… uh… you run the ribbon through the loop and cross them over, like lacing a shoe, sorta," Rose explained as he stood there silent and still for a moment.

"I know how to lace a corset, Rose," he muttered grumpily.

"Is there anything you _don't_ know how to do?" she asked, turning to look at him over her shoulder, her tongue caught in the corner of her smile.

"Are you complaining?" he asked, feeling his irritability vanish in an instant.

"Of course not, I'd be in a real pickle if you didn't," she said, turning back to allow him to get to work.

As much as he tried to avoid brushing her skin, he couldn't seem to help it. His fingers were cold and her skin seemed to blaze hot, and every time he did so, he could see goosebumps rush across her shoulders.

"Sorry," he muttered when she shivered at his touch.

"I don't mind," she said, and if he hadn't known better, he'd think her voice was breathless.

It seemed to take an hour, but it couldn't have been more than five minutes before she was laced all the way down to the top curve of her arse.

"Tuck the ends in at the bottom," she explained after he had tied them off.

Ali couldn't quite believe what was happening as he did so, hands brushing over her bottom as though he had the right. She didn't seem to mind and, when she finally turned to face him, her cheeks were pink and her eyes were bright.

She stepped back and straightened her shoulders. "What do you think?"

Ali took her in. Her blonde hair was twisted into a smooth knot beneath her left ear, with a few strands left loose and curled into soft ringlets to frame her face. Her eyes were a deep shade of gold peering out from behind dark lashes, her mouth was as red and tempting as the fruit in the Garden of Eden.

The golden skin of her shoulders was bare until the wide neck of the golden gown she was wearing, just a few shades darker than her skin, and sparkling every time she moved. Down, across the bodice that wrapped tight around her, to the skirt that swirled away from her legs, and down, down to the gold peep-toe pumps.

"You're beautiful," he said, loving the smile that bloomed across her face like a rose, "considering you're going to freeze the moment we step out of the flat. Have you got a coat? You could wear my leather jacket-" the thought of her in his jacket was far too compelling to be safe, "-if you want. I don't mind the cold."

Rose laughed. "Don't be silly, you lump, of course I have a coat. Stand up straight, I want to look at you too."

Ali realized he'd crossed his arms over his chest and there was no way she could see him. He dropped his arms and stood under her scrutiny for a moment.

"You clean up nicely, Alistair McCrimmon," Rose said, looking him over appraisingly.

"I hate wearing a tux," Ali complained. "Collars and ties… I feel like a dog being dragged about on a lead."

Rose stepped forward, into his space, and smoothed her hand down his tie, stopping just at the bottom of his sternum. Even through all the layers of clothes he was wearing, he could feel the heat of her against his skin as though he were naked.

"Are you sure of this, Rose? Sure you want to be seen with me? Call me your boyfriend?" Ali asked, feeling just a bit breathless.

She looked up at him, eyes deep and dark and mysterious as the space between the stars.

"I'm sure, Ali. Dead sure."


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **I hope you all had an absolutely fantastic and wonderful weekend last weekend, whether you were celebrating any holidays or not. I, personally, celebrated no holidays except "two days off work, woohoo!" It is a sacred celebration among my people that involves copious quantities of hot chocolate, Christmas episodes of my favorite shows, and forcing my cats to cuddle with me until they hide under the bed to get away.**

Jeanne's wedding looked like a glittering fairytale ice palace as Rose and Ali entered together, hands wound so tight around each other that Rose could barely feel her fingers and she was sure that Ali would have bruises in the shapes of her fingerprints across the back of his hand. They only let go to turn their coats over to the two women at the coat check, then they found each other again like magnets.

They shuffled together with the line up to the man directing ushers who turned to them with a vague, bland look and asked that venomously innocuous question, "bride's side, or groom's?"

Rose froze. She couldn't think. She had no desire to admit to her connection to John on this, of all days, and yet…

She looked up at Ali who appeared just as bewildered by the question as she was, his eyebrows had come together over his nose in confusion.

"Bride," Rose said suddenly, feeling as though her brain had rebooted. "The bride is my cousin."

The man seemed not to have noticed their confusion and turmoil, but Rose could feel Ali relaxing beside her.

"That was far more complicated than it should have been," he murmured to Rose as a young man in black tails led them up the aisle and gestured them to a pair of seats on the left side.

Once seated and allowed to fade into the background, Rose felt herself relax slightly and looked around. The beams of the ceiling glittered with silver and lights ( _white lights, as John had wanted with her, she thought_ ). The aisle up the middle was covered in silver silk and there were bows and flowers in icy white, blue, and silver on the end of every row. The music was beautifully performed by a professional band seated in the balcony and she could tell that the lighting had been professionally designed- it was nearly as good as Ali managed for gallery showings.

After taking in the surroundings, Rose glanced over the people. Her mother was sitting several rows ahead with Howard and turned to wave, apparently having been waiting for her to notice. On the other side of the aisle, Donna Noble's hair stood out like a beacon against the white and silver backdrop, as did her deep purple gown. Donna too waved at her and Ali, who waved back. Rose was pleased to see John's sister who had always asserted that if John was fool enough to abandon Rose, he deserved what he got in Jeanne (who she profoundly disliked). She and Ali were best friends going back to childhood, and it was through her that John and Ali had met in the first place.

At the front, there was a bit of movement which preluded the appearance on stage of the minister in his robe, and John and Jack in their tuxedos.

Jack's blue eyes scanned the crowd, and he waved at several people, blowing kisses at Donna and his boyfriend Ianto, and sending a wink at Rose and Ali, who both grinned at waved back to him.

Rose looked down into her lap to avoid looking at John, but Ali seemed to have no such compunctions.

"He's looking at you," Ali muttered to her, leaning close.

"He should be watching for Jeanne," Rose murmured back, though she could feel her cheeks flaming.

"He's glaring at me," Ali continued in surprise.

"What?" Rose asked, finally looking up to discover that, indeed, John was sending a narrow-eyed look at the man sitting next to her, which Ali was returning with interest- his chilly blue eyes were much better at cutting glares than John's chocolate-coloured ones.

He looked strange, Rose thought, with his hair slicked down and his tie properly tied, wearing dress shoes. For their wedding, he'd said he'd wear his trainers, and Rose had wanted him to wear his favorite, tatty, pinstripe suit and style his hair in its usual hedgehog spikes. For Jeanne he'd been willing to change- for her he wouldn't have had to.

"Are you sure about this, Rose?" Ali asked quietly. "We don't have to do it. You don't have to introduce me as anything but-"

"I'm sure, Ali." She turned to look at him, and smiled gently. "You act like I would be ashamed of you, but I'm not. Don't you know that?"

"Rose-" Ali said, and he was looking at her the way he did- the way she had never seen him look at another person in the world- with warmth and affection, and something ineffable and unnameable behind his icy blue eyes.

And suddenly, it seemed as though there was something new between them in that place- something huge and weighty and, if Rose were honest, not new in the slightest.

Then the band began to play the wedding march, and it shattered.

Jeanne's wedding gown was like she was: understated and expensive, and Rose felt gauche in her gold and sparkles. From the front, Jeanne's slim, silver silk dress with the lace overlay looked classically demure, but once she had passed, the back, which was open down nearly to the top of her bottom and draped across with long pearl strands gave her away.

"You're a thousand times more beautiful than she is," Ali murmured, though Jeanne had scarcely passed them.

Rose hoped that she had imagined Jeanne's twitch at his comment, praying that he hadn't been overheard, even as she felt warmth spread across her chest.

Ali seemed not to care. "John seems less pleased than one would expect to see his bride on his wedding day."

Rose had been avoiding it, but lifted her eyes to look at John, who was, she was pleased to see, watching Jeanne rather than the crowd now, with a solemn expression on his face.

The John she had known was never solemn, and Rose decided in that moment that the John she had known must be gone forever.

As John and Jeanne exchanged the vows that Rose should have done a year-to-the-day before, she gripped Ali's hand like a lifeline. He made no objections, just rubbed his thumb up and down the back of her hand, soothing and grounding her in equal measure.

"If any person knows any reason that these two should not be joined, let him speak now, or forever hold his peace," the minister cried into the great, echoing space of the church.

Silence rang for the space of two slow heartbeats, and Rose felt as though every eye in the room were on her as she trained her gaze on the back of Ali's hand where it sat in her lap.

When the minister spoke again to declare John and Jeanne Noble husband and wife, and asked them to kiss, she breathed again, though she could not bring herself to watch this last.

"What God has bound together, let no man put asunder," the minister concluded, and Rose told herself she was imagining the tone of accusation aimed at her.

It was done. John and Jeanne stood hand-in-hand, smiling at their guests and accepting the applause of their friends and family before walking together back down the aisle, waving and smiling at their friends.

When they reached Ali and Rose's row, John resolutely turned away, smiling at the people on his side of the aisle, but Jeanne sent the pair of them a sharp blue look behind her perfect white smile. Ali wrapped an arm around Rose's waist, drawing her subtly toward himself in a protective, possessive move that surprised Rose and made Jeanne's eyebrows raise even as her plastic smile failed to move.

Ali didn't move his hand once the bridal pair was past, only leaned down to speak close to her ear rather than shout above the noise of the moving guests.

"Only the receiving line left to get through, then I'll buy you a drink."

Rose shivered as his breath teased the ultra-fine hairs and sensitive skin behind her ear.

"It's an open bar," she said, hoping the noise would cover the shakiness of her voice.

"Then I'll buy you several and get you home safe," he said, and she could hear the smile in his voice.

"If I didn't know any better, I'd think you were trying to get me drunk and loose, Mr. McCrimmon, but given that you're my boyfriend, I wouldn't have thought you'd need to stoop to such tactics." She felt the hand on her waist twitch, and could feel Ali going tense beside her and realized she'd pushed the game too far. "Sorry," she muttered, shaking her head. "Do you know what I'd really like, Ali? I'd like to dance with you."

"Dance?" he said, sounding confused.

"Surely you've heard of it? Traditional part of a wedding celebration. You know how, I've seen you do it before."

Ali leaned back and looked into her face. "When have you seen me dance?"

She grinned. "In October when we had that big gala at the gallery, Sarah Jane made you dance with that investor… Jade?"

"Jabe," he corrected automatically, then winced.

"She was quite pretty," Rose teased, triumphantly.

"She clung to me like bloody kudzu," he muttered.

"Face it, Ali, you've got the moves."

He shrugged, but his ears had turned red, and Rose could see the crinkles at the side of his eyes that said he was pleased. "Well, I wouldn't want to boast."

"Then show me your moves."

He held her eyes for a long moment, then nodded sharply. "Alright," he said, grabbing her hand, "but receiving line first. And a drink, I think we both need one."

Rose took a deep breath as they joined the rest of the guests who were waiting to give their good wishes to the bridal pair. The line was so long that she couldn't see John and Jeanne from where She and Ali stood at the end and she sighed in relief for the moment of respite.

Her relief did not last long as she heard a voice calling to her.

"Rose? Rose! Rose Marion Tyler, don't you ignore me!"

Rose squinted into the crowd ahead of them and found her mother frantically waving them to join her toward the middle of the line, much closer to the bridal pair than she and Ali currently stood.

Rose shook her head and pointed to the spot they were standing, hoping to communicate that they were fine where they were and didn't want to jump the queue, only to have her mother glare daggers at her in response.

"I don't think she's likely to let up, and she'll make a scene," Ali muttered, sounding resigned as he tugged Rose's hand to pull her out of line and up to where Jackie and Howard waited.

Rose was far-from resigned to the matter, though it seemed she had few choices. She'd been looking forward to the long wait before she had to face John to allow herself to gather her composure. From where her mother was, she could actually see her ex, and she wasn't quite ready for that yet.

Jackie nattered on about the ceremony, the dress, the decorations, and the music, requiring little attention but Howard and Ali's occasional nods or grunts, and Rose was able to retreat into her own head as she prepared herself to face the bridal pair.

" _Jeanne, John, what a lovely ceremony, congratulations,"_ she played in her head, making sure she remembered her line. " _You both know Ali, of course, my… my boyfriend."_

She couldn't flub that last bit, though she hated the words "boyfriend" and "girlfriend." She'd never liked being called a "girl" and Ali was no kind of "boy." "Manfriend" wasn't exactly done, however, and "partner" was so often misconstrued…

She'd liked "fiance" when it had been an option, and had been so looking forward to "husband."

Ali's grip on her hand suddenly tightened painfully and Rose looked up to see that her wandering mind had brought them all the way up to the happy couple. Howard had shaken both hands with a smile, and Jackie was talking a mile a minute to Jeanne, but John stood waiting for them, his smile suddenly looking more like a grimace.

Rose could feel Ali's heat at her back, grounding her, and took a deep breath as she stepped up to the man she'd intended to spend her forever with.

"Congratulations, John," she said with a smile that she hoped reached her eyes better than his did. "It was a lovely ceremony, you look happy."

"I am happy… Rose," he said, seeming loath to say her name.

"I'm glad," she said, and was surprised to find that it was true. All she had ever wanted was for John to be happy. She'd thought he was with her, and having been so very wrong on that score was one of her greatest regrets.

She reached behind herself blindly, and felt her heart sing when Ali took the hint and her hand, stepping up beside her to face John.

"So… you two…" John said, glancing between the pair of them and gesturing vaguely.

"Yes," Rose answered, evenly. "Ali is my-"

She would never be able to explain what happened in that moment. Her mind supplied the word "boyfriend" even while cringing back from the hated term, but her mouth, apparently still some steps behind in her thought process, offered up "-fiance."

It took half a heartbeat for everything to shatter like glass.

"Fiance!?" Jackie shrieked from where she was still speaking to Jeanne. "When the _hell_ did you get engaged?"

"I-" Rose stammered, horrified. "It's not- we're not-"

"You're _not_ engaged?" Jeanne asked, a malicious light in her eyes. "Then why did you say-"

"She wasn't supposed to _say_ anything about it." Ali's low voice cut across the babble like a steel blade, silencing everyone and bringing every eye to him, including Rose who stared at him in open fear and confusion. He met her eyes and gave her a thin smile that didn't quite meet his blue eyes before continuing. "I hadn't meant to even ask yet- was going to make a bit of a show of it on Christmas, you know? Rose's favorite holiday? But I got ahead of myself last night- you know how it is when you're in love. 'Swhy there's no ring- I took my grandmother's ring to be cleaned and I won't have it back for a few days. We weren't to say anything today- didn't want to take any of the attention off of the pair of you."

"I'm sorry, Ali," Rose whispered, still staring up at him, shocked that he had come up with all of that so fast.

He lifted their joined hands and kissed her knuckles gently, meeting her eyes again, his as cold as steel. "'Salright, Rose. No harm done. Best we don't stay for the reception though, after all that." He returned his gaze to their stunned audience and smiled. "It was a lovely ceremony, all the best to the pair of you," he said, before tugging Rose out of line and in the direction of the coat check.

"Rose?" they heard Jackie begin, tentatively.

"Run," Ali muttered to her, starting off toward the coats, pulling Rose along with him.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **So my lovelies, I offer for your pleasure the necessary angst chapter to make this pile of fluff and tropes work. I do hope you enjoy it and (because I love you all so much!) tomorrow's chapter as well, which is the last chapter of this utter silliness!**
> 
> **For now, however, some more Rose and Ali.**

Rose nearly shrieked when a hand from the crowd grabbed her arm and tugged her out of the mass of people and into a relatively secluded corner. She might have done, but she'd recognized the black sleeve from which the hand emerged and knew that her game was up.

"We need to talk," Ali growled, once they were far enough away from the dance floor to be heard without shouting.

The gallery rarely had guests during the day in the week before Christmas- it wasn't an attraction for out-of-town guests, and few would give thousand-pound paintings as a gift- but local businesses frequently rented the space out in the evenings to host their office holiday parties. It was booked all week like this, and Rose had volunteered to work every one, hoping that switching her hours to the evenings would put off her having to deal with the fallout from the wedding.

She'd said not a word to Ali as he'd driven her home, not even goodbye, and she'd kept her mobile switched off all through Sunday, hoping to avoid having to deal with her mother or Jack.

Ali had anticipated her, however, and appeared to be working the evening events alongside her, if his presence was any indication.

She sighed. "You're right, we do. I'm sorry Al-"

"Don't apologize again, Rose," Ali snapped, making her look up at him in surprise. His face was tense- not angry, exactly, just drawn tight as a guitar string. "What's done is done, and unless you plan on running away to outer space for a year without a word, you won't be able to keep ducking your mum's calls much longer."

"How did you-" Rose began, then shook her head. He knew because he knew her. She sighed. "I don't suppose you _want_ to get married. That'd simplify things quite a bit, actually." She looked up to give him an attempt at a smile, only to find him looking at her, eyes cold and sharp as sapphires, the lines around his mouth cut deep as though he were repressing deep emotion.

"Ali-" she began, reaching up to touch his face, only to have him jerk quickly away.

"This isn't time for joking, Rose," he said sharply.

"I know!" she said, drawing her hand back and crossing her arms over her chest defensively.

She was surprised with herself at how little she had been joking. Of course he wouldn't want to, but Rose thought, if she were to marry at this point, she'd very much like them to be someone very like Ali. She had a disappointing feeling that he was, perhaps, one of a kind, and since she'd completely bollocksed up any chance she might ever have had of making _him_ fall in love with her, her chances of finding someone else were vanishingly slim.

She sighed. "We're going to have to break up," she said, watching the toes of her shoes as she spoke. "We can't just tell people we broke up like if it were just… dating. It's going to have to be a proper break-up. And I think it's going to have to be public. And soon."

She winced, waiting for him to berate her- tell her that this was all her fault, and how she could dig herself out of it herself rather than getting him any more involved.

"Not before Christmas," he said, surprising her. She looked up to find him also looking away from her. "I'll not have you have another broken engagement on Christmas. I'll not have it ruined for you again."

Rose's mouth fell open. "What?" was all she could manage.

Ali just shook his head. "New Year's Eve is soon enough. It'll be plenty public and I'm sure we can make something look believable, but not before. I'll not cheat on you though, anything but that."

"Ali, I'm the one who ruined everything, it should be you breaking up with me, not the other way 'round," Rose said, finally finding her tongue.

"I'll do nothing of the sort!" He seemed mortally offended at the idea. "You'll not have another bloke ending your engagement in December, and no one would believe it besides- old bugger like me thinking I could do better than you? No chance. So we'll go to Jack's New Year's do', that should be public enough, and we'll have a great fight. I'm sure Himself'll accept that, given everything."

"Ali-"

"I'll leave once all's said and done, and you can stay and everyone'll comfort you. I'm sure you'll be able to find some pretty boy to kiss at midnight, no trouble, eh?"

He was grinning by this point, a horrible false thing even more upsetting than John's grimace at the wedding. He must have seen her discomfiture in her eyes, because he looked away quickly again.

"I think that'll do then," he said, quickly. "I should go… check on… yeah."

She watched him practically run from her and, for the first time since Jeanne's wedding invitation had arrived, Rose wanted to cry. She had ruined everything.

~?~?~?~?~

Ali sat down at his desk in the back of the gallery which was covered in bits and bobs and half-finished projects that he was constantly working on and might never get right. He haphazardly cleared a spot and dropped his forehead to the wood four times in quick succession- not hard enough to injure himself, just hard enough to punish himself for being a bloody idiot.

He was a consummate coward.

A brave man would have told her how he felt about her months ago, maybe even years. At the very least he would have told her when she'd suggested this mad plan of hers regarding John's wedding. He'd have told her and, depending on how she responded, done exactly what Jack had suggested and taken her to the wedding as her actual boyfriend rather than some sketched facsimile.

But he'd done what cowardly men had been doing for all of time and space: he had stood beside her, loved her from afar, and never once accepted the potential rejection inherent in letting her know what he felt.

He was a liar, and a brilliant one.

Just like the story that had come tripping off his tongue at John's wedding, he'd told himself for a year that he was happy just to have her hand to hold. He didn't need anything else- didn't need her to love him.

Like the lie at the wedding, there was a grain of truth to the whole thing. His grandmother had left him a ring- a lovely deco item that would look spectacular on Rose's slim finger- and he was happy to have her hand to hold. But the rest was bullshit. He knew that if Rose had found someone else, he'd have become a snake, insidiously winding his way between them, perhaps even undermining her relationship.

He was a bastard of the highest order. He didn't deserve her.

Perhaps it was best that everything was ruined and all his hopes were dashed. Her friends would never let her return to a man who had broken her heart. Jack would know the truth, but for Rose's sake Alistair knew he'd keep quiet on the matter. She was as lost to him now as if she were in another universe.

~?~?~?~?~

Rose spent the week working nights and avoiding Ali. She finally turned on her phone and spoke to her mother (if she said more than three words that were really true, they were "I love you, Mum") and texted a near-frantic Jack back.

Friday was Christmas Eve, and the gallery was meant to be closed all day, allowing Rose to finally sleep in before spending the entire next day at her mum's with Ali, pretending her heart didn't near-break every time she was within ten feet of him.

It was, therefore, with blistering annoyance that she answered her mobile at 9:30 to her boss' voice telling her that a last minute party had booked the gallery for that very night.

"Sarah Jane, it's Christmas! We're closed!" she whined.

"I know, but it was someone I couldn't turn down."

"It'd better be the bloody Prime Minister," she complained.

"No one quite that fancy, and you should be grateful too," Sarah Jane warned. "You have to dress up for this one, you can't just wear your blacks."

"What?!"

"It's why I called you so early," Sarah Jane explained patiently. "In case you needed to go shopping. Dressy but not formal. Be there by 7:30, okay?"

Rose sighed heavily but agreed, ending the call and throwing her mobile to the end of her bed. So much for having one day of peace before being forced to play the part of the doting fiance with Ali. Sarah Jane was right, she should probably go shopping for a new dress, but the memory of the last time she'd gone dress shopping, and Ali's warm looks that had made her flush from her toes to the roots of her hair had her digging in the back of her closet rather than considering a trip to the shops.

She chose a dress that was an old favorite: red as a Christmas bauble, with a deep neckline, ¾ sleeves, and a knee-length skirt. She pulled out a pair of black shoes and tossed them to the side, then abandoned the idea of clothes and shuffled into her living room to make tea and spend the day rotting her brain with bad soaps. She couldn't stand to watch X-Files alone, and thought she'd probably never make it past the fourth season where she and Ali had left off.

Six hours later, Rose finally shoved herself off the sofa feeling gross and lazy, and forced herself to put effort into looking more like a human and less like the slug she had spent the day feeling.

It seemed to take forever, and when she was done, though she could objectively see that she looked good, she still felt like shit. She could tell her smile in the mirror was fake, but knew that no one else would see that fact unless they were looking, and at parties like these, no one looked beyond the surface. Because makeup and clothes couldn't fix the fact that she'd broken the most important thing in her life, Rose turned from her vanity mirror, slid into her jacket, and took off for the gallery without a backward glance.

She arrived, cursing the narrow heels on her shoes and the seams in her coat through which the wind blew, and was met outside by Jack, who looked as though the sky was falling.

"Rose!" he cried, spotting her. "Rose, I'm sorry. I didn't realize- they didn't tell me! I'm so sorry, I'd have stopped them if I could."

He was incoherent and she understood none of what he was talking about. "Jack!" she cried. "Slow down. What are you doing here?"

"I was invited. By your mum. To your engagement party… here."

Rose looked at him, saw the pale, drawn cast of his face, and could take no more. She sat on the bus stop bench outside and gave into a fit of hysterics. Even she couldn't say whether she was laughing or crying.

Jack stood watching her for a moment, his face a mask of horror and confusion, then came to sit next to her, keeping a safe distance and clearly ready to jump up at any sudden move.

After a few minutes, Rose calmed slightly, and Jack ventured to speak. "Um… Rose? You okay?"

"I've ruined everything, Jack. I've been an absolute coward and I've ruined the best thing in my entire life."

"Wha-"

"I should have just asked him out. I should have been brave and asked Ali to be my proper date to the wedding. Or even asked him to dinner like a normal bloody human being. But instead I acted like one of those maniacs off of daytime telly and tried to pretend to be dating him. What the hell was I thinking?"

"You were in shock and upset about John and-"

"That's no excuse! I'm smarter than this, and Ali deserves better. The poor man is never going to speak to me again after this and it's all my own bloody fault!" She turned to face Jack, her face pale, but her eyes clear and tear-less. "I want him, Jack. I want Ali. I want to go out with him, I want to date him. I bloody well want to marry him. I think he's it for me, and I've ruined that by making him participate in this… this… _farce_!"

"Just tell him, Rose. I'm sure he'd-"

"Tell him?" Her voice was taking on a hysterical edge again. "Tell him? Tell him I'm head-over-heels in love with him and I put him through all of _this_? He'd laugh in my face and have every right."

"He deserves to know."

Rose shook her head. "I have to break up with him. If I tell him, he'd feel like he owed me something. He's too generous for his own good, and he'd give up his happiness to try to make me happy." She shook her head. "I can't do it, Jack. I can't tell him."

"Why do you have to-"

"Because he deserves better, Jack." All of the fight, the hysteria, even the emotion was gone from her voice. She just sounded exhausted and resigned.

Jack opened his mouth to speak again, but Rose just shook her head, and he closed it with a click. Instead, he wrapped an arm around her shoulders and held her until she was ready to face the crowds inside.

Neither of them noticed the dark-clad figure who had come out to attempt to speak to the pair of them retreat back into the shadows to return to the gallery through the back entrance.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Santa is real, everyone. It's the final chapter of the most tropey bit of terrible fluff that I've ever written, and it's so sweet and fluffy it should be melting in hot chocolate instead of sitting on your computer screen.**
> 
> **Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and here's to 2017 being better than 2016.**
> 
> **(Though it doesn't actually happen on camera,[this is the ring](https://img0.etsystatic.com/121/0/6173482/il_570xN.975263320_q5ti.jpg) that Ali gives Rose eventually.)**

The gallery seemed to explode as Rose and Jack entered together, not-quite-believable smiles pasted on both of their faces. As the crowd surged toward them, Jack took Rose's coat, and retreated as her friends surrounded her.

Mickey and Martha were there; they had been in Cardiff all week, and must have barely dropped their bags at home before coming to this party. Amy and Rory had clearly cut their time in Leadworth with their parents short to attend. Clara had brought her new girlfriend Jenny, a pretty, blue-eyed blonde. Sarah Jane and Jackie stood at the back of the crowd looking pleased with themselves.

Rose knew Ali must be there somewhere as well- her meltdown with Jack had made her late to arrive- but she was too surrounded to find him immediately.

"I always knew there was something between you two," Mickey said, making his way toward her. "Congratulations, Babes."

His hug nearly made her break down and cry, or admit everything.

"No idea how you always end up with the best-looking blokes we know," Martha said as she hugged Rose in turn, making Mickey snort in annoyance.

"You'll not make me wear something terrible as a bridesmaid, right?" Amy asked, shoving Martha aside for her own hug.

Rose was clearly not expected to answer any of this. The girls and her mum chattered and the boys seemed happy to listen and laugh, and Ali was nowhere to be found, no matter where she looked.

Rory was the first to notice that Rose's attention was wandering. "What's wrong?" he asked, pulling her slightly away from the noise.

"Where's Ali?" Rose asked, glancing around again in a fruitless attempt to find him. "He's here, right? He was invited?"

Rory frowned and looked around. Clearly the fact that the putative second guest of honour was nowhere to be found hadn't occurred to anyone but Rose.

"He was here before," Rory assured her, looking about the room with her. "I'm sure he just stepped out for- oh look, there he is."

Rose turned to where Rory was looking to see Ali emerging from the door to the back room. His cheeks and nose were slightly flushed, as though he'd just come in from the biting wind, and his eyes were oddly bright. He was wearing a black shirt with a dark red waistcoat over top. The tiny part of Rose's brain not moaning in misery purred- he looked absolutely edible.

His eyes traveled slowly across the crowd until they found her and, to Rose's complete incomprehension, he smiled at her.

Rose opened her mouth as though to speak, though there was no way he'd be able to hear her from the distance and over the babble, but he just grinned wider and shook his head. With a quick step, he crossed the room to the table she could see piled high with food and with a selection of waiting glasses and took a drink.

"Excuse me!" he called. Rose could only tell that this was what he'd said by reading his lips as his voice did not make an impression on the levels of noise.

"Excuse me!" This time was louder, and Rose could hear him, but she was also listening.

"Oi!" Ali shouted, and this time his voice cut through the chatter and had the entire group turning to look at him, amused. Ali lifted his glass with a single raised eyebrow at the crowd as though daring them to continue to speak.

"I'd like to propose a toast," he continued. "To Rose Tyler, since she's here."

Their friends parted, making an open space between Ali and Rose so that his gaze on her (and when had it become so electric?) was unimpeded.

Rose opened her mouth again, but Ali just shook his head, holding up his glass and waiting. She closed her mouth with a snap and he smiled again.

"Rose," Ali said, and now his gaze was on her, steady as a river. "I think, perhaps, I loved you from the first moment I saw you." He smiled as the room released a collective sigh. "That probably doesn't speak to my credit," he added, "as you were dating another man at the time, but I decided from that moment that I wanted to be a part of your life- as friend, as coworker, as some mad acquaintance of Jack's who occasionally showed up to his parties, it didn't matter. I knew, from that first day, that my life would be less if I didn't know you."

Rose's mouth hung open in shock. This wasn't a quick lie to get them out of a sticky situation. It wasn't holding her hand while having dinner with her mum. It wasn't a necessary distraction. What it appeared to be was suspiciously honest and unprompted. Like it was a real declaration of love.

"When I saw you get your heart broken, it nearly broke mine as well," Ali was continuing. "And I said to myself that if I had anything to say in the matter, I would never see you hurt like that again. I told myself for ages that you couldn't possibly see anything in me. I was too old, too prickly, too… odd. Then one day I overheard you confessing to Jack that you… liked me. Wanted me. Maybe even loved me, but that you couldn't believe that I would want or love you back. You thought you were too… complicated. Too difficult."

Rose froze realizing what Ali was saying. He had overheard her confessing to Jack? She wanted to melt into the floor, but he was still speaking, still holding her eyes.

"I knew then that I had to tell you how I felt- that I do love you. I love every complicated, confusing, difficult, frivolous, foolish, beautiful inch of you and always have done. Maybe it was cowardly to wait until I was sure that you loved me back, but I've been a coward all my life. I am brave enough for this though, to tell you that no matter what happens next- tonight, tomorrow, and for the rest of our lives- good, bad or indifferent, I'm so glad I met you, Rose Tyler."

He tipped back his glass and took a sip, never once breaking her gaze, as their friends burst into applause around them. Rose stood as though frozen- unable to move, unable to think, unable even to breathe.

When the noise quieted, Ali took a step toward her, his smile now tentative rather than bold, and offered a hand.

"I think I owe you a dance."

Rose placed her hand in his and allowed him to draw her, stiff as a robot, to the centre of the gallery as the lights dimmed and Moonlight Serenade began to play over the speakers.

"Who's running lights and sound if you're out here?" she asked, knowing it was a stupid question.

Ali chuckled. "Young friend of mine. Clever lad, name of Adric. That's not what you want to ask me though, is it?"

He knew her too well. "Why? Why did you… do that? Why did you say all that?"

Ali pulled her closer, molding her body to his until she relaxed against him and allowed him to lead her in a slow sway across the dance floor.

"Because it needed saying," he murmured into her ear. "Do you mind?"

Rose let out a laugh that was almost a sob. "Mind that you've apparently been in love with me for years, or that you said it in front of all of our friends and coworkers and my mum who think we're engaged?"

Ali tightened his arms around her. "Take your pick."

"Obviously you know how I feel about you. You heard me blabbing to Jack like a bloody episode of Eastenders."

"True, but it might be nice to hear it myself," Ali said, nuzzling his nose into her hair.

Rose snorted, but conceded the point. "I'm in love with you, you great lump," she said.

"Not exactly flattering," Ali said, and she could hear the smile in his voice.

"I'm mad for you, Alistair. Have been for about six months, but I figured it wasn't a good idea to jump into anything so soon after… but then all this happened and I thought-"

"I'm going to stop you right there, because if you think you're going to apologize again for all of this, don't. It's been odd and frustrating and difficult, but it forced both of us to see what was in front of our noses, and I won't ever let you apologize for that."

Rose said nothing, just sighed and rested her head against his shoulder as he continued to sway with her.

After a few minutes she spoke. "You know we can't be engaged, right?"

"No?" Ali said, sounding honestly surprised. "I don't see why not. All our friends think we are, and I've no intention of letting anyone else marry you. I've even got a ring for you."

Rose glanced up to find his eyes sparkling as he looked down at her.

"I don't suppose it's your grandmother's ring, back from cleaning?" she asked, smiling up at him, her own tongue tucked between her teeth.

"It is, in fact, though it hasn't been being cleaned. It looked fine when I checked on it."

Rose just shook her head.

"We can't be engaged because we haven't been dating!"

Ali raised an eyebrow at her. "Rose Tyler, you know for a fact that if you'd been spending as much time with any other bloke in the world as you have with me this past year, they'd be your boyfriend."

Rose knew it was true, she'd had that very realization herself recently, but still she shook her head.

"We've never even kissed!" she said, lowering her voice to be sure none of their friends and family could hear the confession.

"Now _that_ is entirely true, and a fact which should be remedied immediately, and as often as possible hereafter," Ali said and, without another moment's hesitation, he bent his head and captured her mouth with his in a hot, sweet, soul-stealing kiss that seemed to lance lightning through Rose's veins.

"Yeah," Ali said softly as he pulled away from Rose's mouth when the hoots and shouts of their friends became too distracting. "Not a chance I'd let anyone else marry you."

~?~?~?~?~

One year later, on Christmas Eve, with their friends dressed in red and green silk, and Jackie weeping into Howard's shoulder, Ali and Rose kissed beneath a bower looped with holly and mistletoe as an old vicar smiled and pronounced them man and wife.


End file.
